February 2nd. Friday, 2:49 PM.
"Do you have any plans for the weekend?" Delilah asked, stretching her arms.
Their classes were over. The week was finished. A bit of an early finish for the first years this week after a jam-packed one. After the challenge last week, this week was filled with classes and lectures. After having a couple of weeks to get back into the swing of things, this week brought them back to reality.
"Nah", Malakai replied, shaking his head and putting his bag back down by his side. "Might just lock in and revise or something".
"Revise?" Delilah repeated, narrowing her eyes at him. "You're not going to revise".
"I've got nothing else to do", Malakai replied, throwing his hands up. "And I can't lie, I actually need to revise. I did so shit in that last assignment, it's embarrassing".
"Assignments are important", Delilah said, remembering how she did in that assignment. "They give us points".
"It's not even about the points", Malakai replied, putting a hand on his head. "I don't wanna look like an idiot".
A small smirk crept on Delilah's face, "I guarantee we're going to have a test in two weeks", she said, trying scare him. "So maybe you should revise".
"Tch. I hate tests you know", Malakai said, now putting both his hands on his head. "Do you have plans for the weekend?".
"Not really", Delilah said. "I might go to my grandma's place".
"Can I come?" Malakai asked, straightening his back.
Delilah raised a brow at him, "You said you were going to revise".
"I can revise at your grandma's place", Malakai said with a smirk, like he said something smart.
"Hah, no", Delilah replied, shaking her head. "If you want to meet my grandma, you can, but not right now. She's a little ill".
Malakai's smirk quickly left. "If she's ill, then shouldn't you go?"
"It's nothing serious, it's just a cold", Delilah said, waving it off and not sounding worried. "You know how old people get during winter".
"Hmph. Imagine being old. Could never be me", Malakai joked.
Delilah giggled at the stupid face he was making, "That will be you one day".
"You never know", Malakai casually replied, relaxing back in his chair. "I could die tomorrow".
"Don't say that idiot", Delilah said, lightly backhanding his arm.
"What's he saying?" Benjamin asked from the seat in front, twisting around to look at them.
"Stupidness", Delilah replied with a little smile, shaking her head.
"What else is new?" William asked, joining in and finding a way to ragebait Malakai.
Malakai stared at William for a couple of seconds, his eyes saying, 'What was the point?'. "I'm not even going to say anything to you", he told him, looking away. "I'm going to be the bigger man".
"You're five six, how can you be the bigger man?" Benjamin said. The joke was too easy not to take.
"Pfft".
Both William and Delilah covered their smiles.
Malakai also smiled, but his smile was just pure acceptance. "You're six foot, so I can't even say shit to you", he said. "I'll give you that one innit".
"Delilah, if you ever want to shut him up, just joke about his height", William said, nodding to Malakai.
"Nah, it won't work with her", Malakai said, pointing at her with his thumb. "She's shorter than me".
"No, I'm not", Delilah instantly said, offended. "We're the same height".
"No we're not", Malakai refused.
"You only look taller because of your hair", Delilah said, gesturing vaguely at his hair.
"Is my hair not a part of me?" Malakai asked.
"Yes", Delilah said patiently. "But if your hair was short, we'd be the same height".
"No we wouldn't bro", Malakai said with a grin. "I'll stand up right now and show you".
"Malakai!"
A voice called out from the front of the class.
The four of them froze and turned their heads at the same time to see who had called. It didn't sound like a voice they should hear in this class.
"Why is she here?" William asked, confused like everyone else in the class.
"What did you do to her?" Delilah asked, suspecting that Malakai did something.
"Nothing", Malakai replied, shaking his head. "She sounds happy", he gestured towards her.
"Malakai, look!" Melody said, practically skipping to his desk, holding out her phone. She reached his desk and shoved the screen in front of his face.
"What am I looking at?" Malakai asked, leaning his head forward.
"My video got 50k views on TikTok", Melody said, barely containing herself. "Listen. I put a preview of our song, and the video blew up".
She increased the volume on her phone, and her video started playing. The video was random stock footage of two people walking across the beach, with her and Malakai's song playing in the background, with lyrics at the bottom.
"Yooo, that's sick!" Malakai smiled, looking at the views and likes. "See, I told you".
"What am I hearing?" Delilah slowly asked. "You made a song?".
"Yeah", Malakai nodded like it was normal.
Delilah's eyes slowly flickered between Malakai and Melody,
"Sorry, can I see the video?" Delilah politely asked, pointing to Melody's phone.
"Sure, go ahead", Melody happily replied, handing her phone.
While Delilah watched the video, Benjamin adjusted his chair to make himself more comfortable and said,
"You two finally finished the song".
The boys knew about the music-making, as Malakai had told them, and showed them a bit of the song.
"Yeah. We finished it last Friday", Melody replied. "I was just too scared to put it out".
"Have you released it?" William asked, copying Benjamin and readjusting his seat.
"No. Not yet", Melody replied. "I don't know when we should release it", she said, looking at Malakai.
"It's your song", Malakai said with his palms up. "You can release it whenever you want".
"I say keep promoting it", Benjamin suggested, interested, as he liked music.
"Yeah. That's the plan for now", Melody nodded, agreeing with him. "Releasing it next week is a bit too soon".
"You might as well spam the preview", Malakai said.
"Yeah. Become those artists who tease a song for ages and make people beg for it in the comments", Benjamin said.
"No, I can't do that", Melody replied, shaking her head and leaning against Malakai's desk.
"When artists do that, it pisses me off", Malakai said. "Like, what's the point of teasing it for that long?".
"Most of the time they haven't finished the song, but they like what they've made, so they make a video", Melody replied.
"Have you had that feeling?" William asked.
"No", Melody shook her head and pushed her glasses up as she looked to the floor. "I've been scared to release anything".
"She's got a little PTSD about releasing music", Malakai teased, pointing to his temple.
"Shh!" Melody said, swinging her head to Malakai and putting a finger to her lips.
"It sounds really good", Delilah said, with an impressed look in her eyes, handing Melody her phone back. She listened to it a couple of times. That's how much she liked it. "Have you released it yet?".
"No", Melody giggled, seeing Delilah's wanting the song and happy with the praise. "The release date is still undecided".
"It's a love song, right?" William randomly said. "Why don't you release it on Valentine's Day? It's in less than two weeks".
Everyone turned to William.
"What?…" William asked, suddenly self-conscious, intimidated by everyone's eyes.
"The times when you use your brain, you actually can be smart", Malakai said seriously.
"That's such a good idea", Melody said, her eyes lighting up.
William saw Melody already planning her next move in her head. "I thought that was obvious", he whispered to Benjamin.
"Imma be real. I forgot it was February. I thought we were in January still", Benjamin replied.
William put a hand on his chin. "I always knew I was smart", he muttered, proud of himself.
"Wait, did you sort out the beat?" Malakai asked, looking at Melody like he missed a deadline. "Can you use it? Like... the producer ain't gonna sue you if you use the beat".
"I already sorted it", Melody confidently replied, seeing the stress in his expression. "I emailed them, and they liked the song, so they were cool with it".
"Did you have to pay for the beat?" Malakai asked, making sure.
"Nope. We just agreed that'll we'll work together more", Melody replied. "They sent me loads of other beats too and offered to mix my future songs for me".
"Damn, you've already gotten a producer", Malakai said, impressed and relieved.
"Yo, this is like those stories of those artists that start with nothing, and they make it big with their producers and shit", Benjamin said, thinking about a few of his favourite artists.
"Did you make other songs?" William asked.
"I did", Melody nodded. "Malakai only recorded a couple of short verses on random beats".
"Let's hear them", Benjamin said immediately, smirking, wanting to hear more.
"They're on my computer", Melody replied.
Benjamin and William whipped their heads to Malakai.
"I don't have them", Malakai said, nonchalantly, shrugging. "When she said short verses, she meant like six to eight lines. And some of the words were just mumbled. The only song I have is this one".
"Can you send it to me?" Delilah asked Malakai, picking up her phone.
"It's not my song", Malakai replied with a smirk, being annoying.
Delilah shifted her gaze to Melody.
Melody hesitated, confused, switching gazes between Malakai and Delilah. "Y-yeah. Send it to her", she said, like there wasn't going to be any other answer. "Why do you need to ask me?".
"I don't know. In case she leaks it", Malakai replied.
"She isn't going to leak it", Melody instantly said, before Delilah could even respond.
"Yeah, but that's how music gets leaked. Friends send it to friends", Malakai replied, pulling out his phone.
"Are you going to make a music video for the song?" Benjamin asked Melody.
"Um... I'm not sure", Melody slowly replied, looking at Malakai to get his answer.
Malakai could feel her eyes. "It's up to you", he said, looking up from his phone, sounding like he didn't mind.
"I was just going to release the audio", Melody replied. "Making a music video did come to mind, but it sounds like too much work".
"A music video would help the song do well", Delilah said.
"It doesn't have to be anything complicated", William randomly said. "You can just record you and Mally going on a date on your phone or something and edit it to make it look cute".
Everyone turned to William again.
"What…", William was feeling self-conscious again.
"What have you done to William bro?" Malakai asked, seriously. "You're too smart to be him".
"What are you talking about?" William asked, baffled.
"That's so smart", Melody excitedly said. "I can picture it already. It would fit the vibe perfectly", she said, looking up like there was a screen playing her vision of the video.
"Yeah, I've seen music videos like that", Delilah said, feeling Melody's excitement. "They're really good".
Benjamin put a hand on William's shoulder, "I'm proud of you bro. Two smart ideas in one day".
William was both happy and offended at the compliments he was getting. He didn't know what face to pull.
"I don't know how to edit though", Melody said, quickly realising and putting a hand on her cheek. "Do you?".
"Nope", Malakai said flatly, putting down his phone. "Do you lot?".
Benjamin and Delilah shook their heads.
"I think Ray and David know how to edit a little", William said.
"Oh yeah", Benjamin remembered. "Ray used to upload his shooter clips online, and David helped him".
"Editing a whole music video is a different level though", Malakai said.
"And before Valentine's too", Melody added.
"You don't need to release the music video on Valentine's Day", Benjamin said. "You could release the audio only, and then when it starts to pick up views, you could release the music video later. A lot of artists do that".
"That's perfect", Melody happily replied, as everything had just clicked into place. She stopped leaning on Malakai's desk andturned to him with a huge smile. "Malakai, we're making a music video".
Malakai just smirked. "Aryt, Beyoncé", he accepted, with his hands up.
"Melody", Delilah said. "What is your artist name?" she asked, curious.
"It's just my name with another with two extra y's on the end", Melody replied, turning away a little embarrassed.
"So creative", Malakai sarcastically said, teasing her.
"Coming up with an artist name is so hard, you know", Melody shot back.
"Mally, what's yours?" William asked.
"Mally", Malakai replied with a straight face.
"So creative", Benjamin sarcastically said, mocking his exact tone.
"Bro, I'm not gonna be an artist. So I don't care", Malakai replied, leaning back.
"You still need to make a profile", Benjamin said. "People will hear the song and will want to find out more about you".
"He's right", Delilah added, resting her head on her fist. "If you're going to release it on Spotify and all of those platforms, you need an account".
"But I'm not gonna release songs like that", Malakai replied, like it was a hassle and not seeing the point.
"You should make one", Melody said, lightly tapping his shoulder. "In case we make more songs together".
The in case was just thrown in there. The look on Melody's face was that they were definitely going to make more songs together.
Malakai let out a deep sigh, showing he couldn't be bothered. Leaning back in his chair, the suggestion physically drained him.
"Mally, don't worry, I'll help you", William eagerly said. "We can do it later".
"If the song goes viral, you can make money", Benjamin said, grinning as he said money.
"Say no more. How do I make an account?" Malakai quickly asked, snapping upright as if he'd just been switched on.
The group bursts out laughing, seeing his mood do a complete 180.
"Um, yeah, that's all I wanted to show you", Melody said, turning to Malakai, still oozing her happiness.
"Hold up. Why don't you two make a TikTok right now?" Benjamin said, stopping Melody from going. "It would help promote the song".
"Yeeaaahh! I wanna see that", William said, far too excited.
Malakai and Melody looked at each other, neither of them wanting to do it, but Melody wasn't totally against it.
"I don't mind", Melody slowly said, not sounding so sure. If Malakai agreed, she would be down.
Malakai could feel that Melody wanted to do it, but wanted him to join. "Wait", he reached into his inside blazer pocket. "I'll do it, but I'm covering my face", he said, pulling out his ski mask.
"Why do you have that?" Delilah asked, raising a brow and staring at the ski mask, a little disturbed.
"I was showing someone it", Malakai replied. "I think it was Chris or Christina... or maybe both of them". He looked back at Melody. "I don't have another one".
"It's fine", Melody said, shaking her head, her face showing she clearly didn't want to put a ski mask on. "I don't mind showing my face".
"Why don't you wanna show your face, Mally?" William asked. "Is it because of your scar?".
"I don't wanna be famous", Malakai replied, putting the ski mask over his nose, but not over his head yet. "How we doing this? Are you lot gonna jump in?".
"Why would we do that? Benjamin said, lost, not seeing the point.
"For vibes innit", Malakai said, shrugging while taking off his blazer.
"Why are you taking off your blazer?" Melody asked, watching him.
"We can't bait out the academy", Malakai replied, putting his blazer on his desk.
"Oh, you're right", Melody said, realising, looking at the crest on her blazer. She quickly slipped off her blazer and put it over Malakai's.
Malakai pushed his chair back and stood up, "It's good we're at the back. We've got this space", he said, walking into it.
"So how are we going to record this?" Melody asked, her voice shaking a bit, getting nervous, her eyes frantically dancing around the class.
"You could lean your phone against my bag", Delilah said, putting her bag on her desk.
"No one's gonna be cameraman?" Malakai asked, finally putting the ski mask over his head, so only his eyes were showing.
"Wouldn't that be too awkward?" Delilah asked back. "Just standing and recording you".
"Also, if someone is recording, they might move the camera around", Benjamin added. "Leaning against her bag will keep it still".
"Now that you've said it. It does sound better", Melody said.
She set up the TikTok video and propped her phone against Delilah's bag. She double checked the angle before stepping back.
At the same time, whispers started spreading around the room.
"What are they doing?" Tanisha quietly asked, turning in her seat.
Most of the class was doing the same. Heads turnt and bodies twisted towards the back.
"Why's Malakai wearing a ski mask?" Serena asked, seeing Malakai standing to the side.
All of a sudden, music started playing.
"They're making a video", Rose said, seeing Tanisha timidly moving and lip-syncing to the song.
"What song is that?" Nicole asked, listening closely, trying to catch the song, thinking it was a popular song.
When I met you I found affinity
So I won't stop till you found stability.
"Is that Malakai's voice?" Nicole said, her eyes widening after hearing the rapping voice.
Everyone in the room could hear the song clearly. It was Malakai's voice over the beat.
"It is", Maria said, surprised, instantly recognising it and staring at Malakai.
"Did they make a song?" Tanisha asked, seeing Malakai and Melody vibing together, with Melody moving more confidently with Malakai.
"That's cool", Nicole admitted, a smile forming on her face.
"Let's do that again", Melody said, jogging towards her phone to reset it.
"Mally, have you done this before?" William asked, grinning at him.
"You looked like an actual rapper bro", Benjamin said.
"You lot been knowing this though", Malakai replied, his eyes making it obvious he was smiling. "I'm wavey bro".
"That looked really good", Delilah said, standing beside Melody, watching it back with her.
"I'm not going to be shy this time", Melody said, having some confidence after the first try.
By now, the entire class was watching. More than interested.
"I want to join in. It looks fun", Rose said. She always wanted to record videos like that.
"I'm surprised. The song sounds really good", Nicole said, finding herself swaying to it.
"She a wicked woman, I need witch love!
Dress up, go out, take pics, love!".
Malakai was rapping his lyrics for everyone to hear to the camera, while Melody was vibing next to him, and Benjamin, William and Delilah were vibing behind the camera.
"Yeaaah. That's the one", Benjamin said, hyped, taking the phone.
"Oh no…" Melody laughed, covering mouth. "I wanna make more".
"TikTok's?" Delilah asked.
"TikTok's and songs", Melody smiled.
"You lot jump in for the next one", Malakai said, sharing Melody's feeling of wanting to make more.
"Hell yeah!" William said, already taking off his blazer.
Benjamin drafted the video for Melody and handed back her phone, "Yeah, let's go", now wanting to join in after seeing how fun it looked.
Delilah stayed silent where she was.
"Delilah, cmon man", Malakai said, noticing her staying behind and waving to her to come.
"Nah, I'm fine here", Delilah said, waving her hands in front of her with a shy smile.
"Delilah, it's fun", Melody said with a sparkle in her eyes. "You might feel awkward the first time, but after that it's good".
Delilah was still reluctant. It was clear she wasn't confident. This type of thing wasn't for her. She didn't mind being in videos for only friends to see, but the internet was different.
Malakai glanced around and noticed the whole class watching them.
"Any of you lot wanna be in the TikTok vid?" he asked loudly.
Maria turned to Rose, "You said you wanted to join them", she said. "Let's go", she stood up, not wasting this opportunity.
"You sure?" Rose asked, her face lighting up. "Are all of you coming?",
"Yeah, why not?" Nicole said.
"Is it fine for us to join?" Serena asked, feeling out of place. "Are any of you friends with that girl?".
"Delilah's there, it's fine", Maria said with a reassuring smile.
Once Maria stood up with her friends, others followed. People got up from their seats and joined the crowd. A couple of seconds later, just over ten people were standing in front of Malakai and Melody.
"I was wondering what you guys were doing", Ray said, walking to William.
"It was like I was watching a music video being recorded", Lucas said.
"We should've called you guys over", William replied.
"Dancing's not my thing", David said. "I had fun watching you guys".
"You don't have to dance", Benjamin said. "Just do what Malakai does, just move your hands like you're rapping with your hands. Then add a bit of body and shoulder movement".
"I can't do that", David replied with a little smile. "Malakai has rhythm. I don't".
"You'll be fine", Benjamin smirked, patting his back.
"See, Delilah, now you've got friends with you", Malakai said, nodding behind Delilah.
Delilah turned to her friends and gave a little embarrassed smile, "I'm just going to stand next to you guys", she quietly told them.
"Delilah, you can dance. I've seen you move your hips", Tanisha teased, poking the side of her stomach.
"Hey, hey, hey, hey", Delilah smiled, giggling while swatting her hand away.
Melody watched as everyone was smiling, being friendly and having a good time without anything actually even happening. "Your class is so fun".
Malakai looked at what she looking at, "Yeah, it's not that bad", he smirked under his ski mask. "Aye, everyone needs to take off their blazer for the vid!".
Everyone was getting ready and started to stand where they wanted.
Nicole went up to Melody, "Hey, did you two make this song?".
"Yeah", Melody nodded.
"It sounds really good", Nicole complimented.
"Thanks".
"What's the song called?" Maria curiously asked.
"I'm starting the video", Benjamin announced, standing next to the phone.
Melody turned back to Maria. Her expression was almost glowing. Her smile was proud and cheerful before answering,
"Law Of Attraction".